150 Captivating Rumi Quotes to Help You Enjoy Life

It’s not a coincidence that the poetry and quotes of the great mystic, poet and philosopher from the 13th century Persia is still widely read and studied by scholars and common people alike. The simplicity of his poems combined with his accuracy on expressing the true nature of the human soul make him accessible to everyone, making him one of the great masters of global culture.

Rumi proposes a way of life based on truth and not on the conventions of everyday life which are regarded to be a kind of prison that most people spend their lives in. Love is a reoccurring topic in his poems, presented as a path to wisdom and a destination at the same time. His concept that everything is a part of a greater whole is a rather modern idea, explored even by scientists nowadays. This concept of Sufi teachings has become a tool for modern societies to understand the link which connects humans and nature to the great power that moves the universe.

Table of Contents

1. Best Rumi Quotes
2. Rumi Inspirational Quotes
3. Deep Rumi Quotes on Life
4. Deep Rumi Quotes About Living in a Community
5. Rumi Quotes on Healing
6. Rumi Quotes on Gratitude
7. Accepting Ourselves and the Other Quotes by Rumi
8. Poetic Visions About Existence
9. Rumi Quotes About Travel
10. A Short Biography of Rumi

Best Rumi Quotes

• You had better run from me. My words are fire. Rumi
• You are the Truth from foot to brow. Now, what else would you like to know? Rumi
• What you seek is seeking you. Rumi
• The wound is the place where the Light enters you. Rumi
• Don’t grieve. Anything you lose comes round in another form. Rumi
• If you are irritated by every rub, how will your mirror be polished? Rumi
• Shine like the whole universe is yours. Rumi
• When you do things from your soul, you feel a river moving in you, a joy. Rumi

• Love is the whole thing.
  We are only pieces.
  Rumi
• Dance, when you’re broken open. Dance, if you’ve torn the bandage off. Dance in the middle of the fighting. Dance in your blood. Dance when you’re perfectly free. Rumi
• Silence is the language of god, all else is poor translation. Rumi
• In Silence there is eloquence. Stop weaving and see how the pattern improves. Rumi
• Why do you stay in prison
  When the door is so wide open?
  Rumi
• These pains you feel are messengers. Listen to them. Rumi
• Sell your cleverness and buy bewilderment. Rumi
• Everything in the universe is within you. Ask all from yourself. Rumi
• You have to keep breaking your heart until it opens. Rumi
• I know you’re tired but come, this is the way. Rumi
• Beauty surrounds us. Rumi
• Let yourself be silently drawn by the strange pull of what you really love. It will not lead you astray. Rumi

• Either give me more wine or leave me alone. Rumi
• Only from the heart can you touch the sky. Rumi
• Woman is the light of God. Rumi
• The only lasting beauty is the beauty of the heart. Rumi
• Whenever we manage to love without expectations,
  calculations, negotiations, we are indeed in heaven.
  Rumi
• Whatever purifies you is the right path, I will not try to define it. Rumi
• As you start to walk on the way, the way appears. Rumi
• Maybe you are searching among the branches, for what only appears in the roots. Rumi
• Be melting snow.
  Wash yourself of yourself.
  Rumi
• But listen to me. For one moment
  quit being sad. Hear blessings
  dropping their blossoms
  around you.
  Rumi
• When you feel a peaceful joy, that’s when you are near truth. Rumi
• The lion is most handsome when looking for food. Rumi
• Not only the thirsty seek the water, the water as well seeks the thirsty. Rumi
• What matters is how quickly you do what your soul directs. Rumi
• Whoever’s calm and sensible is insane! Rumi
• Very little grows on jagged rock. Be ground. Be crumbled, so wildflowers will come up where you are. Rumi
• Your heart is the size of an ocean. Go find yourself in its hidden depths. Rumi
• I searched for God and found only myself. I searched for myself and found only God. Rumi
• Let silence take you to the core of life. Rumi
• I said: what about my eyes?
  He said: Keep them on the road.
  *
  I said: What about my passion?
  He said: Keep it burning.
  *
  I said: What about my heart?
  He said: Tell me what you hold inside it?
  *
  I said: Pain and sorrow.
  He said: Stay with it. The wound is the place where the Light enters you.
  Rumi

Rumi Inspirational Quotes

• Don’t be satisfied with stories, how things have gone with others. Unfold your own myth. Rumi
• It’s your road, and yours alone.
  others may walk it with you,
  but no one can walk it for you.
  Rumi
• Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing
  and rightdoing there is a field.
  I’ll meet you there.
  When the soul lies down in that grass
  the world is too full to talk about.
  Rumi
• Stop acting so small. You are the universe in ecstatic motion. Rumi
• People who repress desires
  often turn, suddenly,
  into hypocrites.
  Rumi
• Yesterday I was clever, so I wanted to change the world. Today I am wise, so I am changing myself. Rumi
• There is a candle in your heart, ready to be kindled.
  There is a void in your soul, ready to be filled.
  You feel it, don’t you?
  Rumi

• And you? When will you begin that long journey into yourself? Rumi
• When you go through a hard period,
  When everything seems to oppose you,
  … When you feel you cannot even bear one more minute,
  NEVER GIVE UP!
  Because it is the time and place that the course will divert!
  Rumi
• That which God said to the rose, and caused it to laugh in full-blown beauty, He said to my heart, and made it a hundred times more beautiful. Rumi
• God turns you from one feeling to another and teaches by means of opposites so that you will have two wings to fly, not one. Rumi
• All people on the planet are children, except for a very few. No one is grown up except those free of desire. Rumi
• The truth was a mirror in the hands of God. It fell, and broke into pieces. Everybody took a piece of it, and they looked at it and thought they had the truth. Rumi
• There is a voice that doesn’t use words. Listen. Rumi
• Keep walking, though there’s no place to get to.
  Don’t try to see through the distances.
  That’s not for human beings. Move within,
  But don’t move the way fear makes you move.
  Rumi
• Soul, if you want to learn secrets,
  your heart must forget about
  shame and dignity.
  You are God’s lover,
  yet you worry
  what people
  are saying.
  Rumi
• Don’t wait any longer.
  Dive in the ocean,
  Leave and let the sea be you.
  Rumi
• No more words. In the name of this place we drink in with our breathing, stay quiet like a flower.
  So the nightbirds will start singing.
  Rumi

Deep Rumi Quotes on Life

• Set your life on fire. Seek those who fan your flames. Rumi
• You were born with wings, why prefer to crawl through life? Rum
• Give your weakness to one who helps. Rumi
• Try something different. Surrender. Rumi
• If you want to be more alive, love is the truest health. Rumi
• Learn the alchemy true human beings know. The moment you accept what troubles you’ve been given the door with open. Rumi
• Patience is not sitting and waiting, it is foreseeing. It is looking at the thorn and seeing the rose, looking at the night and seeing the day. Rumi
• If Light Is In Your Heart
  You Will Find Your Way Home.
  Rumi
• Forget safety.
  Live where you fear to live.
  Destroy your reputation.
  Be notorious.
  Rumi
• Be like the sun for grace and mercy. Be like the night to cover others’ faults. Be like running water for generosity. Be like death for rage and anger. Be like the Earth for modesty. Appear as you are. Be as you appear. Rumi
• Try not to resist the changes that come your way. Instead let life live through you. And do not worry that your life is turning upside down. How do you know that the side you are used to is better than the one to come? Rumi
• The breezes at dawn have secrets to tell you
  Don’t go back to sleep!
  You must ask for what you really want.
  Don’t go back to sleep!
  People are going back and forth
  across the doorsill where the two worlds touch,
  The door is round and open
  Don’t go back to sleep!
  Rumi
• The morning wind spreads its fresh smell. We must get up and take that in, that wind that lets us live. Breathe before it’s gone.
  Rumi
• Moonlight floods the whole sky from horizon to horizon;
  How much it can fill your room depends on its windows.
  Rumi
• Let’s get away from
  all the clever humans
  who put words in our mouth
  let’s only say what our hearts desire.
  Rumi
• You were born with potential.
  You were born with goodness and trust.
  You were born with ideals and dreams.
  You were born with greatness.
  You were born with wings.
  You are not meant for crawling, so don’t.
  You have wings.
  Learn to use them and fly.
  Rumi

Deep Rumi Quotes About Living in a Community

• Raise your words, not voice. It is rain that grows flowers, not thunder. Rumi
• Be a lamp, or a lifeboat, or a ladder. Help someone’s soul heal. Walk out of your house like a shepherd. Rumi
• I want to sing like the birds sing, not worrying about who hears or what they think. Rumi
• Start a huge, foolish project, like Noah…it makes absolutely no difference what people think of you. Rumi
• Like a sculptor, if necessary,
  carve a friend out of stone.
  Realize that your inner sight is blind
  and try to see a treasure in everyone.
  Rumi
• The fault is in the one who blames. Spirit sees nothing to criticize. Rumi
• The beauty you see in me is a reflection of you. Rumi

Rumi Quotes on Healing

• Ignore those that make you fearful and sad, that degrade you back towards disease and death. Rumi
• If you desire healing,
  let yourself fall ill
  let yourself fall ill.
  Rumi
• The ocean takes care of each wave ’til it gets to shore. You need more help than you know. Rumi
• Where there is ruin, there is hope for a treasure. Rumi
• The grief-armies assemble, but I’m not going with them. Rumi.
• Suffering is a gift. In it is hidden mercy. Rumi
• The cure for pain is in the pain. Rumi
• Sit, be still, and listen,
  because you’re drunk
  and we’re at
  the edge of the roof.
  Rumi
• Sorrow prepares you for joy. It violently sweeps everything out of your house, so that new joy can find space to enter. It shakes the yellow leaves from the bough of your heart, so that fresh, green leaves can grow in their place. It pulls up the rotten roots, so that new roots hidden beneath have room to grow. Whatever sorrow shakes from your heart, far better things will take their place. Rumi
• There is a secret medicine given only to those who hurt so hard they can’t hope.
  The hopers would feel slighted if they knew.
  Rumi

Rumi Quotes on Gratitude

• Be grateful for whoever comes, because each has been sent as a guide from beyond. Rumi
• Who could be so lucky? Who comes to a lake for water and sees the reflection of moon. Rumi
• If in thirst you drink water from a cup, you see God in it. Those who are not in love with God will see only their own faces in it. Rumi
• At the end of my life, with just one breath left,
  if you come, I’ll sit up and sing.
  Rumi
• The ground’s generosity takes in our compost and grows beauty! Try to be more like the ground. Rumi
• Thankfulness brings you to the place where the Beloved lives. Rumi

Accepting Ourselves and the Other Quotes by Rumi

• Let the beauty we love be what we do. There are hundreds of ways to kneel and kiss the ground. Rumi
• You are not a drop in the ocean. You are the entire ocean in a drop. Rumi
• People want you to be happy.
  Don’t keep serving them your pain!
  If you could untie your wings
  and free your soul of jealousy,
  you and everyone around you
  would fly up like doves.
  Rumi
• You wander from room to room
  Hunting for the diamond necklace
  That is already around your neck!
  Rumi
• Do you know what you are?
  You are a manuscript oƒ a divine letter.
  You are a mirror reflecting a noble face.
  This universe is not outside of you.
  Look inside yourself;
  everything that you want,
  you are already that.
  Rumi
• Anyone who knows me, should learn to know me again;
  For I am like the Moon,
  you will see me with new face everyday.
  Rumi

Poetic Visions About Existence

• We come spinning out of nothingness, scattering stars like dust. Rumi
• What hurts you, blesses you. Darkness is your candle. Rumi
• The angel is free because of his knowledge, the beast because of his ignorance. Between the two remains the son of man to struggle. Rumi
• I didn’t come here of my own accord, and I can’t leave that way.
  Whoever brought me here will have to take me home.
  Rumi
• You are a volume in the divine book
  A mirror to the power that created the universe
  Whatever you want, ask it of yourself
  Whatever you’re looking for can only be found
  Inside of you.
  Rumi
• They say there is a doorway from heart to heart, but what is the use of a door when there are no walls? Rumi
• This place is a dream. Only a sleeper considers it real. Then death comes like dawn, and you wake up laughing at what you thought was your grief. Rumi
• Pull the thorn of existence out of the heart! Fast!
  For when you do, you will see thousands of rose gardens in yourself.
  Rumi
• Like a shadow,
  I am and I am not.
  Rumi

Rumi Quotes About Travel

• Travel brings power and love back into your life. Rumi
• Two there are who are never satisfied — the lover of the world and the lover of knowledge. Rumi
• Come, come, whoever you are. Wanderer, worshiper, lover of leaving. It doesn’t matter. Ours is not a caravan of despair. come, even if you have broken your vows a thousand times. Come, yet again , come , come. Rumi
• Although the road is never ending
  take a step and keep walking,
  do not look fearfully into the distance…
  On this path let the heart be your guide
  for the body is hesitant and full of fear.
  Rumi

A Short Biography of Rumi

Jalāl ad-Dīn Muhammad Rūmī, widely known by the name Rumi, was a renowned Persian poet, Sufi mystic and Islamic scholar born in 1207 in either Balkh (a town in present-day Afghanistan) or Wakhsh (in present-day Tajikistan). Rumi’s lineage was filled with seasoned Islamic jurists, mystics, and theologians, including his own father, who was a well-known theologian and Hanafi jurist. Throughout his life, Rumi was inspired greatly by his father as well as the famous Persian poets Sanai and Attar.
Around 1220, to escape the invasion of the Mongols, Rumi’s father Baha’ ud-Din safely led his entire family and a group of followers thousands of miles west, passing through a number of cities before finally settling in the city of Karaman and, some years later, in Konya (both located in present-day Turkey). Turkey was a country in which he not only spent the majority of his adult life but also wrote most of his poetry. In Konya, Rumi’s father was made a teacher and the head of one of the city’s many madrassas (religious school for the study of Islam). Upon his father’s death, Rumi took over his father’s position at the madrassa, became a prominent Islamic Jurist and began issuing Islamic religious rulings and moving from one mosque to another to preach.
The loss of a dear friend and instructor inspired Rumi to write one of his most famous masterpieces known in English as The Works of Shams of Tabriz, followed by Masnavi, It Is What It Is, The Letters, and Seven Sessions. Following his demise in 1273, most of his major works were taught and made famous in the West by the renowned American scholar Shahram Shiva. Today, in the western world, Rumi’s teachings are much accepted as a foundation to the beliefs of Sufism.
Despite his death several centuries ago, today Rumi is one of the most widely read poets in many parts of the world, including in the United States, where he is considered the best selling poet in the country. His poems have also served as a foundation for classical music from several countries and have even appeared on top of the U.S. music charts on a number of occasions.

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